Former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, Japan's longest-serving leader, died on Friday after being shot while campaigning for a parliamentary election, News.az reports citing Koydo News Agency

A man opened fire on Abe, 67, from behind with an apparently homemade gun as he spoke at a drab traffic island in the western city of Nara, Japanese media showed earlier.

It was the first assassination of a sitting or former Japanese premier since the days of prewar militarism in the 1930s.